


I Alone

by eratospen



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age: Origins
Genre: Alistair loves taking orders, Belly Kink, Body Diversity, But done through the lens of kink, Dirty Talk, F/M, Fat Shaming, Feeding, Feeding Kink, Fetish, Fetish Discovery, Light Dom/sub, Self-Discovery, Stuffing, Weight Gain, and Anora loves giving them, sexual awakening, very light
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-23
Updated: 2015-09-08
Packaged: 2018-03-31 20:54:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 15,735
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3992527
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eratospen/pseuds/eratospen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anora has come to care for Alistair the way she cared for Cailan, but no matter how many people tell her how handsome her husband is, she's never been attracted to him (or, really, much of anyone)...until he starts putting on weight. Then the floodgates open and Anora begins to learn things about herself she never would have suspected.</p><p>Warning: This is a Dragon Age male weight gain / belly kink story. If that doesn't sound like your thing...it probably isn't.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

“You are a very lucky young woman,” her maid said, carefully braiding Anora’s hair. 

Anora made a low noise of agreement, eyes fixed straight ahead. Outside, the bells of Denerim were already pealing, and peasants were calling out to each other in raucous cheer. Businesses were closed by royal decree, and the streets had flooded with food carts and amusements. Jugglers and acrobats roamed the square and children screamed for each other as they ran wild beneath the feet of their drunken parents. The whole city was in an uproar of happiness for her; the very least she could do was pretend to share it.

“A very, _very_ lucky young woman.”

Within the castle, the maids were all in a bustle keeping the royal guests content while avoiding their wandering hands. Prince Cailan would no doubt be with his most trusted friends, carousing—perhaps snagging a few chambermaids about the middle and hoisting them close, murmuring with ale-scented breath: “Give us a kiss, will you? I’m to be married today.”

“Prince Cailan is the most handsome man alive. Fair and strong and _strapping_ , the way any lad ought to be.” The woman leaned down to meet Anora’s eyes in the mirror, lines crinkling across her weathered cheeks as she smiled. “And you looking so beautiful. Why, the two of you will have no match in all Ferelden. What I wouldn’t give to be you today, m’lady.”

She swallowed. “Yes,” Anora said, and only Andraste herself would know how fast her pulse raced at the lie. “I am very happy. Thank you.”


	2. Chapter 2

“You look well,” her father murmured, one big hand eclipsing hers as he slipped it neatly along the crook of his arm. He didn’t look at her, but then, Loghain Mac Tir saw everything whether he deigned to look or not. “I assume you received instruction.”

“Of course,” Anora said. She kept her head up, shoulders back, spine stiff. The smile she wore had been carefully practiced in the weeks leading up to her marriage, and she’d gotten so good at pretending joy at the thought of joining her life with that of her old friend that even Cailan believed her. “I am ready and eager to start my new life.”

Her father’s grip tightened and she flushed, eyes dropping to the delicate tilework. “Lie better,” Loghain said, and brushed his thumb across her knuckles. “So you are marrying a fool. You are going to be a great queen someday. Content yourself with that.”

“I will.” She glanced up at him as they strode arm-in-arm through the foyer, taking in the hard, craggy profile she loved so much. She was being ridiculous. She did care for Cailan—messy, over-eager pup that he was. And she cared more for her family, her country. She wasn’t doing this for herself.

So what if she sometimes looked at her handsome soon-to-be-husband and felt nothing but creeping dread? So what if she felt no desire for him—indeed, felt desire for very few men she had ever met? Sometimes those sorts of things took time, and no doubt Cailan would delight in being able to teach _her_ something for a change.

The gilt doors opened and she refocused her attention, lifting her chin a subtle inch higher. _You’re going to be Queen,_ she told herself, walking toward her grinning (drunken? Oh, perhaps, but what did it matter?) new husband with all the grace and poise of Andraste herself. _The rest will come with time._


	3. Chapter 3

“What do you think?”

He _was_ drunk, but not sloppy with it. Anora had watched her new husband from beneath the fan of her lashes all through the feast, and though he had been in high color and even higher spirits, she noticed he’d also been careful to water down his wine.

That was _good_. It meant he _cared_. Now it was her turn to show a token of her own regard.

“You’re beautiful,” Anora murmured, repeating what she’d always heard the other women say as she reached out to brush her fingertips along the hard planes of his body. He was a warrior through and through, every line of him chiseled, as if he’d been carved from stone. His blond hair had fallen free of its queue and was half in his eyes. His smile was sweet and almost shy, despite the fact she knew he had done this before.

“Ah…yeah?” Cailan rubbed the back of his neck. “Want to tell me _how_ beautiful?”

The waggling brows made her laugh, the way she knew he intended, and Anora gave herself permission to press closer. She slid both hands up that bare, perfect chest, waiting for the sparks that would surely now come. Her maids had been very specific about the experience of attraction and pleasure; she was a locked door, and he was the key. All he had to do was…

What?

All he had to do was _what_ and she’d open gladly for him. It was infuriating how vague their instructions had been.

“Anora?”

She mentally shook away the creeping panic and smiled, dragging her nails down his shoulders because…well, because that seemed the thing to do. The freckled skin pinked nicely and Cailan shuddered hard. His breathing picked up tempo and she could feel the heat being cast by his body. _Make me feel it too_ , she thought, digging her nails in harder. _I want to feel that way with you._ “I think enough women have extoled your virtues that you could recite them by heart,” she said, stepping away.

His color deepened. “Ah. Anora, don’t be cross…”

“I’m not,” she said with complete honesty. “I’d never expect you to be chaste.” _Or loyal to our marriage bed._ That part she didn’t say, though she could read the understanding in his eyes. He flinched, but gave a faint nod. Good. They understood each other. If he was going to do it anyway, she may as well get ahead of any potential hurt feelings and give her permission.

She brushed back her loose golden hair and tipped her chin, smiling again. He beamed back, responding to her shifts in mood the way he always did. “Perhaps you want a turn extolling _my_ beauty, though?” she teased. She brushed a hand down the front of her simple silk shift and nearly laughed when his eyes eagerly followed. Maybe she could make something of this after all. “You may disrobe me.”

He snorted, but jumped to the task with the sloppy eagerness of a newborn mabari. “Yes _ma’am_ ,” her husband said, bearing her back onto her wedding bed in a ripple of heavy soldier’s muscles, his calloused hands pushing up her shift to rove over her skin.

Anora sucked in a breath, bracing against the shiver of arousal…and felt nothing. Not even when he stripped her bare and sucked her coral-pink nipples into his hungry mouth. Not even when he slid one hand down to fist his cock, the other pressing between her tightly clamped thighs. Not when he rubbed thick fingers into the dry center of her, or kissed up her neck to her mouth with hot, wet, ale-scented breath, or moved on top of her, or met her eyes, the head of his cock pressed against her core, and murmured, “Okay?”

She smiled up at her husband, brushing back his hair with a fondness that filled her chest the way pleasure hadn’t, and wrapped her thighs about his slim waist. “I love you,” she said—and as he thrust too-rough inside her, she realized that despite everything, she was starting to mean it.


	4. Chapter 4

The love grew, matured, tempered by strains of fond annoyance for his eternal boyish charm.

Desire never did.


	5. Chapter 5

“I’m a widow,” Anora murmured, staring at herself in the mirror. “And now I’m once again a bride.”

“There’s no shame in being anxious.” Her maid’s words were soft, reassuring as she carefully braided Anora’s long blonde hair. Outside the arrow-slit windows, the bells of Denerim were pealing. Crowds of commoners called out to each other over the ruined streets, and children laughed as they wove between jugglers, musicians, brightly-dressed performers of all kinds come to gawk at their Queen marrying the Bastard Prince.

It was strange, she thought, how fully her life now echoed what came before. It was strange how trapped she could feel as everything just…cycled on.

“M’lady?”

“I’m not anxious,” Anora said, flicking her gaze up to meet the older woman’s eyes. She smiled, willing it to catch in her own eyes. “The world has been saved, my father still lives, and the succession will be assured. I am content.” _Not good enough._ “I am happy.”

The elderly woman patted her cheek as if she were a child, then returned to coiling those long, thick braids. “And who wouldn’t be happy, marrying such a man as King Alistair?” she said. “The spitting image of his brother…and so very, very handsome.” Smile lines formed like a weathered map about the woman’s kind eyes. 

Anora’s stomach flipped as anxiously as it had years before.

Perhaps, if she were being honest with herself, more now than it ever had then. Cailan she had known. This Alistair was a stranger to her.

“Is my father ready?” she asked as the woman placed the last pin, rising and smoothing her hands down her slim hips. The gold of her circlet caught the light, dazzling in its intensity. _You are a woman grown_ , she reminded herself fiercely. _You are a queen._

Her maid gave a quick curtsy, sensing the dismissal. “I will check, m’lady. And… If I may…” She hesitated.

“Yes?” Anora said, willing herself to relax into an answering smile. That was part of her job—to be gracious, open, charming to a fault, no matter that she had a better head for numbers than small talk. That had always come easier to Cailan, who had a _way_ with people Anora had never quite mastered. He’d promised to teach her someday.

Maker, she would never forgive him for dying and leaving her to the mercies of a new life.

“You’ll be happy again someday, m’lady,” her maid said—quietly, as if she understood just how far she was crossing the line. “I promise you that. This young King Alistair—”

“That will be all,” Anora said, turning away again. She moved to stand by the window, staring blindly down at the mad press of humanity. They waved banners with House Theirin’s coat of arms emblazoned across the front. Now and again, she spotted the seal of the Grey Wardens amongst the colorful blur. This day was as much theirs as hers, Anora supposed. The Hero of Ferelden was a ghost haunting her city; was it any surprise she would also haunt her wedding night?

She remained where she was until the door closed softly behind her retreating maid. Then, finally alone, Anora drew in a ragged breath. She let her head dip forward until it rested against the tempered glass, and oh Maker, it felt so blissfully cool against her flushed skin. Her eyes burned and she wanted to cry—for poor foolish Cailan, for all those who passed during the Blight, for her father’s loss of freedom, for herself—but she bore down against the impulse and locked away the ache.

 _Later_ , Anora told herself, staring blindly out at the mass of waving banners, of people, of barely escaped death. _There will be time for all that later._


	6. Chapter 6

“So, ahhhhhh…”

It was surreal how very like his brother Alistair looked in the darkness of their bedroom (shared between them, though each had their own quarters flanking the official Royal Chambers). Tall. Fair. Muscular, as if carved from granite. He even had similar scars, though these of course traced his body in new ways. The likeness wasn’t exact, but it was enough to make her stomach twist unhappily.

This man was _not_ her husband.

Though…now, she supposed, he actually was.

Maker.

“We should get this over with,” Anora said, abruptly turning away. She reached up for the buttons that lined the front of her silken tunic, remembering the way Cailan had ripped them years before in his young eagerness. She’d been uncertain then, unschooled, fumbling for a pleasure that had never really come. Now, she was older; she knew her body, and she knew what to do with his. This didn’t have to be awkward.

“This is unbearably awkward, isn’t it?” Alistair said, unconsciously echoing her thoughts.

She stilled, then glanced over her shoulder. Her new husband was flushed berry pink, all the way up to his spiky blond hair. The loose trousers and shirt he’d been made to wear for the consummation clung to his frankly beautiful body—she’d heard the maids whispering; she knew what she was supposed to think—in a way that should have made her pulse race.

Instead, she turned back to him, and let her chilly mask drop. “It is,” Anora said. “We’re little more than strangers.”

“And you’re all connivy. No offense,” he added quickly.

Her lips quirked. “I’m a little ‘connivy’,” Anora admitted. “But now I’m on your side.”

Alistair hesitated. “Are you?” he asked, before quickly waving both hands as if to scatter the words away. “No, no, ignore that, ignore— Look. Ah. _Anora._ I know neither of us really wanted this.”

She arched her brows and went to perch on the end of the bed, hands folded demurely in her lap. “Go on,” she said when it seemed he was about to falter.

“…right. I didn’t exactly want to be King. I liked my life. I liked that it was simple. Sort-of simple. Well, it was simple until the Blight, but you understand what I mean. I was following orders—point me at a darkspawn and I could stab it. I can’t do that with all these political-y people.”

“Our ambassadors would be rather put out if you went around stabbing them,” she agreed.

Alistair snapped his fingers and pointed as if she had just made some brilliant point. “See? Not a good plan. Putting me in charge of a country? Also not a good plan. But you…this is what you do, right? You’re all, ah…” He trailed off again, moving to sit by her on the bed.

“Connivy and political-y?”

“ _Yes_. And we may not have been on the same side before, and neither of us may have wanted this marriage—” She made a surprised noise to hear him admit as much out loud, but didn’t interrupt. “—but we’re here now, and we can help each other. You know, good old teamwork. If we wanted. I do. Want that, I mean.”

It was…an unexpectedly wonderful surprise to realize she wanted that too. “All right, King Alistair,” Anora said, brows lifting at his exaggerated wince over the title. “I’m willing to accept a tentative partnership. What do you suggest for our first steps?”

“Ah.” He flushed. He rubbed the back of his neck. He practically squirmed. Anora watched in slowly growing amusement as Alistair’s cheeks went from pink to a brilliant red, and he coughed in his fist as if that could somehow make him spit it out. “Ah. Sooooo.”

“Do you want me to guess?” she finally asked.

“What? No! Maker, no. It’s just.” He scrubbed at his face hard. “Look, my friend Leliana has been telling me about consummation customs amongst, you know, important people.”

The amusement that had been building in her chest suddenly went cold. “Ah,” she said.

“…And I’m already blundering. Grr-reat. Look. There are ways to— There are other customs that— We don’t have to—”

Anora threaded her fingers together tight and waited him out, refusing to let the sudden bubble of nerves overtake her. Things had eventually reached a happy medium with Cailan. They worked together to make an heir, and he stopped trying to awaken in her…things which weren’t within either of their power to awaken. The prospect of fumbling her way toward a similar sort of understanding with a new husband was, Maker, not where she wanted to be at this point in her life.

Ever. It wasn’t where she wanted to be _ever_.

But she was no coward to let him flail and stutter and not try to face whatever he had to say head-on. “Alistair,” she said, meeting his eyes frankly but keeping her tone gentle. “What are you trying to say?”

He let out a long, explosive breath and slumped forward a little. “Look,” he said again. “I may not have licked any lampposts yet, but I’m savvy enough to know when one doesn’t _want_ to be licked. In winter or summer or any time at all. And that’s _fine_! That’s, that’s great, that’s okay, I’m okay with that, and I want to make sure it knows I’m okay with it. I think maybe I could really come to like this lamppost just fine, and I don’t want to make it feel uncomfortable or anything. You know?”

“No,” she said, utterly baffled. “I have no idea what you mean.”

“ _Sex_. Or, uh, lack thereof. Here, so, put your leg up in the bed,” Alistair added quickly when Anora pulled sharply back. He hopped down and hurried to the far side of the bed, throwing one leg in. “Like this. Come on.”

 _It’s quite possible I married a madman_ , she thought, but the familiar amusement layered with fondness she used to feel so often for Cailan was bubbling through her reserve again. Slowly, she moved around the bed and—brows arched—did as he asked.

Alistair grinned at her, a faint dimple flashing. “Annnnd look at that. We just completed an Orlesian consummation,” he said, swinging his leg down again. “According to Leliana, it’s perfectly legal and binding. True, it is most often used for lords and ladies who marry when they are too young to, ah, well, you understand. But! You get the picture, I assume. We are married and consummated.”

“And no lampposts licked,” Anora murmured, watching her new husband with open curiosity.

He flushed. Again. “And no lampposts licked,” he said. “Rrrright.”

“Thank you, Alistair,” Anora said, leaning over the bed to take his hand. She squeezed his fingers, heart giving an uncertain little lurch when he squeezed back. “That was very perceptive of you. And…kind.”

“Oh, whew, well,” he said, beginning to beam back at her. “That’s good to hear. We’re going to be stuck with each other for a long, long forever. Sure hate to mess it up on the first go.”

She squeezed his hand again. “We’ll work on an heir eventually,” she promised. “Once there has been time to adjust to Cailan’s passing.”

“No, of course,” Alistair said quickly, other hand falling over hers. “Take all the time you need.”

“And I don’t expect you to remain faithful,” she continued as if he hadn’t said anything. “I understand that you have needs, and—”

He cut her off there. “That isn’t…ah, thanks, but, that isn’t how I…work. So much. So no.” Anora arched a brow. “Thank you,” Alistair added quickly. “But no.”

She opened her mouth to argue…then decided to let it go, for now. He would, she knew, change his mind in time. As much as he’d loved her, Cailan had never hesitated to find willing bedpartners. “Very well,” she murmured before climbing purposefully into bed. “I assume we’ll have to share tonight?” she added at his shocked expression.

“…oh. I hadn’t thought that far ahead.” Alistair hesitated, as if uncertain how to proceed. Then he awkwardly climbed in next to her, immediately pulling the covers over him. His big warrior’s body was so stiff she almost laughed. “Sleep well, Anora.”

She watched her husband, lips quirking despite herself, and considered leaning in and brushing her lips across his as a test. Or perhaps just a sealing of their bargain. _Partners_. It had a good ring to it. But in the end, she settled down against her pillows before blowing out the candle, leaving him unkissed. “Sleep well, Alistair,” she said, and closed her eyes.

It had been a long day, and there were many more ahead of her.


	7. Chapter 7

_The funny thing about not kissing your husband on your wedding night,_ Anora thought much, much later, watching with fondness as he wrestled to remember the speech she’d helped him write:

_The more time that passes, the harder it is to initiate._


	8. Chapter 8

They settled into an easy routine that managed to feel, at the same time, not at all routine.

The first year of their marriage was the hardest Anora had ever experienced. For the first few months, they were elbow-deep in the ruin of huge swaths of the city, not to mention lingering darkspawn swarming the ravaged countryside. But even as things slowly began to normalize, tensions flared with the Free Marches, city-states demanding compensation for their “good graces” and willingness to accept so many Fereldens fleeing the path of the Blight.

“Willingness, bah,” Anora said, setting aside the stack of papers for Alistair to read at his leisure. “As if they weren’t tossing out just as many as they took in!”

“What’s that polite way you have of saying _go fuck yourself_ , again?” Alistair said with big, faux-earnest eyes. “I always seem to forget in times of greatest need.” 

Anora laughed. It was amazing how easy it was becoming for him to make her laugh. “I’ll write it down for you,” she promised, pausing to squeeze his shoulder. He reached up to cover her hand, gesture impossibly fond, and she had to turn her face away to hide the conflicted blush at the feelings that simple moment stirred up.

A whole year had passed, and not once had Alistair pushed to exercise his marriage rights. He hadn’t even pushed her for a _kiss_ (though now that the pain of Cailan’s loss had faded to a soft ache, she was no longer unwilling. No, scratch that, she was _very_ willing, if only to express how much she was coming to care. It just seemed…odd to bring it up now, after all this time.)

“Right,” Anora said, gently tugging her hand away. “I’ll see you at tonight’s banquet.”

Alistair groaned. “Do I _have_ to come and be kingly? It feels like all I do is sit there, bored out of my mind, and stuff my face to keep from falling asleep.”

“Yes, you _have_ to come and be ‘kingly’,” Anora said. “I’ll speak with the staff to make sure we have plenty of dishes you’ll enjoy. If you’re going to just stuff yourself through these meeting,” she added at Alistair’s pleased expression, “you may as well derive some pleasure from it.”

“Considering that’s what I’ve had to do more nights than not these last three months, I appreciate the thoughtfulness.”

She smiled and pulled away before she could give into temptation and brush a kiss over his terribly silly brow. “Wear the red coat,” she said as she crossed the room. “I’ve asked your footman to leave it out for you.”

But when she slid into her seat next to Alistair’s—their guests smiling politely and the feast laid out in gleaming silver before them—he was wearing _blue_ , not red. She bit back a frown, not missing her husband’s flush at her pointed look. It was unusual for him to outright deny a request. Typically, Alistair was so eager to please that he went out of his way to accommodate her.

But there was something else actually wrong, she noted with quietly growing alarm as the formal dinner began. Alistair wasn’t being his usual charming self. He kept shifting awkwardly in his seat, barely letting his glass be refilled with fresh wine before he was downing it again, and again, as if trying to ward off old pain. He hardly touched his food despite earlier claims—even his favorites—and he barely spoke a word, relying on Anora to carry the conversations. That wasn’t so unusual when they reached delicate negotiations, but this—entertaining—was where Alistair normally shone, not her.

It was all so unlike him that she could barely wait for the cover of a course change to lean in and murmur, “Are you ill?”

The all-too-familiar flush spread across his cheeks and he squirmed again in his chair, visibly uncomfortable. “Ah. No, not as such. Or at all. Really. Not at all.”

 _That_ didn’t make her feel any better. “What is the matter?”

 _Squirm. Shift._ “It’s nothing. Ignore me. Oh look, candied pheasant. My favorite.” His usually lively voice was utterly flat.

“Alistair,” Anora said, her own voice sharpening; he straightened immediately in response, shoulders back, chin up—parade attention, as if she were his commanding officer. Well, if that would get him to admit what was wrong so she could _fix it_ , she had no compunction against using his ingrained impulse to obey. “Tell me.”

Their guests were beginning to notice their whispers—and Alistair’s flaming cheeks—but she just smiled coyly and tipped her head closer. They were still newlyweds, of a sort; they could get away with a little flirtatious canoodling.

Then Alistair shifted _again_ , as if his chair were plank wood and not plush velvet, and Anora caught his arm and dug in her nails. _Hard_. He coughed. “I put on the red coat, like you asked,” he admitted in a low voice. “But it wouldn’t… Ah. That is, I couldn’t get it to… Um. Oh, Maker, I’ll just come out with it, then, all right? I must have packed on some weight since we had it made; I couldn’t get it to fasten even when I laid on my back and sucked in.”

Unexpectedly—shockingly—a delicious shiver worked its way through _her_ at those words. That _image._ Alistair—fit, muscular, athletic, warrior Alistair—laying on his bed, sucking in his stomach for all he was worth, fighting to fasten straining buttons over soft padding that had crept onto his Warden’s physique when neither of them was paying attention.

She couldn’t help herself; her eyes dropped to his waist, and Anora fought another unprecedented, _hot_ little shiver at the sight of the blue coat (roomier, designed to be a little loose) pulled taut over the subtle swell of his stomach.

It was such a little thing. She wouldn’t have even noticed if Alistair hadn’t said anything—she _hadn’t_ noticed that he was putting on weight at all. But as her eyes zeroed in on her husband, she could see a thousand and one tiny changes that, bizarrely, made the blood rush liquid-hot through her body. The waist of his fine trousers dug cruelly into his stomach, forming a tiny not-quite roll of flesh that peeked over the edge every time he breathed. The buttons of his coat struggling over the very slightly softer chest, the tiny paunch. The subtle softening about his jawline and the way he shifted every few seconds as if in pain.

The pants, she realized, unexpectedly squirming in her own chair. The pants hurt as they cut into his stomach. _That’s_ why he wasn’t eating. Well, that and bruised vanity. A man like Alistair couldn’t have been used to facing the inevitable result of a Warden’s famous appetite and a king’s physical inertia. Being…softer…must have been a whole new world for him.

Anora couldn’t explain why her breath was quickening at the idea, her heart beginning to pound—second-hand embarrassment? Sympathy?—as she leaned close again and murmured, “Spread your napkin over your lap. When their attention is on me, pop open your button to make room for your—” The words went strangled and bizarrely husky in her throat, and she switched tracts. “To make room. You need to eat.”

Alistair puffed out a breath. “ _Do_ I?” he muttered sulkily. “The fact that nothing fits seems to indicate that I better not.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Anora said, tone sharpening again against her control. Why _did_ she feel so out of control? Maker, but it was warm in here. “Our esteemed guests will notice if your habits suddenly change, and besides—you have a famous Warden appetite to live up to.” He was still sulking; it was stupidly adorable, though she’d never admit it. “You have the generosity of your table to live up to. They expect you to take part in the festivities in all its forms, whether you’re feeling missish about your waistline or not. You’re the king, Alistair; act like it.”

He cast her a quick, hurt look, but he also moved to _obey_ as she turned back to their guests—keeping a subtle eye on her husband—and engaged them in lively conversation. She had to drop her hands into her lap to hide their shaking when he subtly hitched up his hips and popped open his trouser button. She wasn’t sure, but she thought she saw a flash of angrily marked skin as his stomach pressed out just a little; she _knew_ she heard his sigh of relief as Alistair relaxed back into his chair…and ruefully gestured for the footman to serve him a heaping helping of candied pheasant.

For the rest of the evening, she kept half an eye on him as she played politics and he ate…and ate…and ate…apparently taking her tart words to heart. By the time they rose to leave their guests, her stomach was a mess of butterflies and his was swelling out in a more obvious paunch, stuffed full as if to show her he could follow her instructions to the letter.

She was so happy with that because she liked the orderly pleasure of being obeyed; that was all. What else could it be?

Alistair huffed a breath as they walked toward the steps leading up to their room and paused at the foot, looking toward the second flight wistfully. “Maybe I can sleep here,” he muttered, words slurring a little together from the wine.

“Not on my watch,” Anora countered, hesitating a moment before sliding a delicate arm around her husband’s middle. His sides weren’t necessarily soft, but they weren’t _firm_ anymore either, and when she shifted, her fingers accidentally brushed along the swollen front of him. _Maker_. “Come on.”

She helped him up to bed, leaving him in the blank-faced hands of his personal manservant, then fled to her own room, where she banished her maids the moment she was undressed.

Slipping into her bed, skin too tight for her body, Anora tossed and turned through much of the night, thinking of her husband’s whispered confession…and burning at the image of him popping open his trousers to allow his brand new stomach room to grow.


	9. Chapter 9

She watched Alistair like a hawk after that, though she couldn’t manage to puzzle out why the evidence of his weight gain mattered so much to her.

It didn’t make _sense_ , and Anora didn’t like things that didn’t make sense. She put a great deal of stock in spinning order out of chaos; in rules and schedules and justice. She was never happier than when she could help the city planners rezone the battered districts, or haggle with the Antivan merchant princes for better imports, or dabble in the Game her husband—and, truthfully, most of her countrymen—scoffed at. She’d always enjoyed puzzles as a girl and her father had taught her famous military campaigns as a way to help her order her mind. When broken down to their component parts, wars, politics, trade—they all made _sense_ for her.

The hot pleasure she felt realizing Alistair had now outgrown his entire wardrobe? _That made no sense._

“There’s no point being embarrassed, Alistair,” she said bullishly, standing by the window and pretending not to watch with baffled, intense interest as the seamstress measured her furiously blushing husband.

Alistair stood in the center of the room in his smallclothes, shirt off, arms outstretched. It was the first time she had seen him so bare in…she couldn’t remember how long. She might have tried to sneak a glance before if she had realized he would be so… So…

Inexplicably _appealing._

She wet her lips and glanced down, then back up again, fighting against the confused jumble of her thoughts. Was she experiencing _attraction_ to Alistair? No, Anora decided, that wasn’t quite it. She felt flustered, not crashing waves and sudden lightning and all that other nonsense the maids were always whispering about. It was a twisting in the pit of her own stomach, a flutter in her chest; that was all.

And the fact that it spiked when the seamstress slid the measuring tape around her husband’s growing middle, the edges ever-so-slightly digging against the soft layer of flesh that covered what had once been rock-hard abs… Well. That was just madness.

And Alistair was talking. How had she zoned so completely out that she’d missed that? She _never_ missed anything.

“…as a Warden.” He dropped his arms when the seamstress nodded to him and gave a little sigh. He’d gained a little more since that first revelation of a dinner. Not much—just enough for his once perfectly flat stomach to stick out a little when he relaxed his posture. It wouldn’t even be noticeable from the front, but standing where she was, Anora could trace its pleasing slope with her eyes. “I suppose I figured a super-metabolism had to go with the super-hunger. But all this time, it really was just schlepping across Ferelden and back again, fighting darkspawn and chasing after Dog. Maybe I should take up training with the guard. I bet they could whip me back into shape in no time. The last thing they’ll want is a fat king.”

He gave his stomach a little smack, snorting at the way the skin oh-so subtly _rippled_ with the impact.

Anora bit the inside of her mouth hard and counted back from twelve before she could answer. “No,” she said. “That would be a fool’s errand. None of the men would truly push you, and your presence during their drills would only make them uncomfortable. You’re the king now, Alistair; you can’t act like a common Warden anymore.”

“The Warden’s aren’t a common anything,” he said mildly enough, though she could feel the hurt threading through his words.

“I’m sorry,” she said as nakedly as she could in front of a witness. Then, to the seamstress: “Now leave us. You will be paid well to keep an eye on the king’s wardrobe and make any necessary adjustments or additions in either direction. Understood?”

“Aye, m’lady. M’lord.” The woman gave a brief curtsy and left the royal chamber.

Alistair sighed as the door shut, turning back to the mirror. He pulled a face, prodding at his stomach once, then flexing to make his arms go tight with muscle. That made him snort again, and he turned toward her with both arms flexed, brows waggling playfully. “Being king may be making me fat, but at least part of me still knows how to look good. Maker knows I’ll take whatever small mercies I get.”

She gave a breathless laugh and moved to join him, pretending to feel his muscles at Alistair’s playful leer. “Very impressive,” Anora said. “Though you know…that is... Well. You don’t need a warrior’s physique to be a very attractive man, Alistair.”

He froze.

 _Maker take my hide_. Anora flushed and dropped her gaze, but that just made her uncomfortably, impossibly aware that she was standing in her husband’s bedroom with him almost entirely undressed. She very nearly turned and fled at that, but her father hadn’t raised a coward, and there was something she wanted to say. “There are a great many men in the world,” she managed. “Of a great many sizes, and shapes. What is…pleasing…on one isn’t pleasing on all. And you shouldn’t think that just because you had to be one way before that you can’t be perfectly, ah, handsome another way now.”

“Sooooo,” Alistair said slowly, voice dipping low and goofy as he tried to make up for her obvious discomfort. “You’re saying that if I’m going to be squishy anyway, I may as well embrace my fate and think of myself as _handsome_ and squishy?”

“I’m saying,” she said past the lump in her throat, “that you carry it well and damn what anyone else might think.” Daring much—daring everything—Anora reached out and rested a bare hand on her husband’s naked chest…then slid it down to his stomach.

 _Soft_. So soft and warm against her fingertips. Not quite weighty enough to be called plush, but still so unexpectedly good. She felt a faint jolt at the contact—not enough to mean anything, but more than enough to make her jerk back, eyes flying to meet Alistair’s. His were _huge_ , wide and dark at the unprecedented caress, pupils dilating rapidly. So strange that this was their most intimate touch of their married lives. Even stranger that she wanted to do it again; to feel him even _softer_ beneath her fingers. What would it be like if he were truly chubby? _Fat_? Hot and giving beneath her palm, and—

She stepped back, swallowing hard.

“You like it,” he said, not quite a question.

 _Don’t ask me that; I don’t know how to answer you_. But she gave a faint nod anyway, arms crossing over her middle. “Being overweight suits you,” Anora said. “I don’t see any need for you to try to reverse it.” Then, because perhaps she was a coward after all: “I have to go.”

She turned on a heel and practically fled the room, breath coming in rapid, hummingbird-fast pants in her chest for no reason she could even hope to understand. Out of all the confused jumble of her thoughts, there was only one thing she knew.

Alistair had been right: she _liked_ the feeling she got when she looked at him. And she wanted more.


	10. Chapter 10

Weeks passed, and they never spoke of her confused confession again. Their lives progressed as they always did—hearing cases, passing judgments, entertaining guests, and restoring their country brick by brick by brick. They slipped back into their comfortable partnership as if that small, strangely intimate exchange had never happened.

With one exception: Alistair seemed intent on driving her _mad._

“This is delicious,” he enthused, words muffled, mouth full. They were alone together for a rare private dinner, so there was no need to scold him about table manners…especially not when her attention kept getting trapped by the frankly voracious way he set about stuffing himself silly. He made low, pleased noises every few bites, jaw working overtime until his utensil scraped his plate. A servant was there seconds later to serve him another portion, and Alistair just beamed up his thanks before tucking back into his meal with single-minded focus.

The way he had been eating lately was…she had no words for what it was, but it made her own stomach twist as she watched him out of the corner of her eyes. It was nearly impossible to focus on her own meal when Alistair was sitting across from her, consumed with stuffing his mouth—his stomach—his whole slowly plumpening body with as much food as he could get his hands on.

He tore a strip of flesh from bone with glistening fingers, lips soft—almost _sensual_ —when he took his next bite. Sauce dripped across the meat of his palm and down his wrist; Alistair made a low noise and sucked it off, tongue tracing up exposed skin to catch every last drop. There was something disturbingly sexual about the way he ate, though it wasn’t until she’d become aware of his gain that she’d started to notice. It was as if he poured all of his pent-up urges into these simple, earthly pleasures until the mere act of swallowing a mouthful of wine became an orgiastic experience.

But no, it hadn’t always been like this—had it? It couldn’t have. She would have _noticed_. It was as if, now that he had been given tacit permission to let himself go, he was throwing himself into gluttony whole-heartedly.

It was as if, Anora thought—mouth going dry when her husband leaned back with a low _moan_ and rubbed his full belly, eyes subtly cutting toward her as if to gauge her reaction—he was doing it for her.

She couldn’t keep her eyes from drifting to his stomach. He’d stuffed it well past a normal man’s capacity, Warden hunger giving depths to a hedonism he wouldn’t have been able to achieve on his own. The effect was…oddly pleasing, if temporary. She knew from experience by now that the round bloat of his gut would be gone in the morning, leaving behind perhaps just a touch more padding to his slowly softening flesh. Nothing like the dramatic paunch she sometimes (guiltily) imagined him wearing, but enough to draw her attention all the same.

A small roll of flesh around the tightening waist of his trousers. The subtle softening of his hard jawline. The hint of a potbelly slowly beginning to threaten the clean lines of his jacket. The promise of more…and more…and more as the weeks passed and Alistair threw himself into eating as if it were a sport.

“Maker,” he breathed now, leaning back in his chair. His plate was at last empty with nothing left on their shared platter to re-fill it. He blew out a breath, stifling a burp politely in a fist before dropping both hands to absently rub his distended stomach. It was gloriously stuffed—gravid and heavy-looking, like a woman in her early term of pregnancy. Its rounded curve strained the buttons of his coat with each breath he took, and Anora felt a confused flash of heat when she noticed the wide V of his fly.

Alistair caught her looking and flushed, even as he shrugged. “I had to unbutton my pants,” he said, a tentative boldness to his words…as if he were testing a theory he wasn’t yet certain of. “They were getting unbearably snug. Maker, I should watch myself: I’m just getting _fatter_.”

She jerked her eyes back to her own still-mostly-full dish. “Yes,” Anora said, the backs of her lids painted with the image of her stuffed and bloated husband years from now if he continued eating like this: lolling back in his chair, trousers undone, making way for the huge dome of his gut. It would be a monstrous thing, filling his lap and forcing his thick thighs apart, the swollen edge bumping up against the lip of the table every time he breathed. His chest would be softer, too, straining against his skin-tight shirt, and his arms would be a meaty mix of fat and muscle. He’d surely have a second chin ringing his handsome face, deepening as he dropped his head and gave a blissed-out sigh, stuffed stupid and impossibly full on a heavy meal that made him so incredibly big and round and…and…

_Attractive?_

Her stomach twisted hard and she mentally skittered away from that thought—then rose to her feet fast enough to nearly send her chair toppling over. “I am tired,” she said, refusing to let herself look at her husband. “Good night.”

“Good night!” he called out after her, but she was already fleeing the sight of him, heart pounding near loud enough to drown out the world and stomach twisting in something that felt very much like anticipation.


	11. Chapter 11

As fate would have it, Anora was obliged to leave the country for a series of diplomatic missions only a short time later.

“Be careful,” her husband urged sotto as he led her out to her carriage. It seemed all of Denerim had turned out to see her off, cheering the royal couple and waving banners emblazoned with their house sigil. The city had almost completely recovered from the Blight by now, but at a great cost to the royal coffers—this long, invigorating political tour would bring in desperately needed coin to help the rest of the countryside in its efforts to rebuild.

They were counting on her; Alistair was counting on her.

Warmed to the core, Anora squeezed his arm, her hand tucked into the crook of his elbow. “I will be careful,” she promised, voice just as low. The Queen’s Guard was waiting at attention, armor gleaming in the sunlight. “Even better, I will be _smart_.”

“You always are,” Alistair said dryly. He turned to face her when they reached her carriage, smile warm but a little sad. This mission was vital to the health and wellbeing of Ferelden, but still…she felt a little wistful leaving, too. It would be many long months before her work was done and she could come home. “Will you write to me?”

“Of course.”

“Do you promise?”

There was a note of almost child-like hope in those words. It was enough to make her heart all at once begin to pound, and she suddenly wanted— _longed_ —to reach out and cup his cheeks. To brush her lips for the very first time over his.

They had been married for going on two years now, and she had not yet _kissed_ him, despite caring for him a little more and more every day.

 _I want to_ , Anora realized, studying her husband’s sweet, earnest, open face. _I want to so very badly_. Just brush her lips over his again and again and again. Perhaps close her eyes and tip her head—allow herself to be drawn against his softening body, his chubby stomach brushing against her with every breath. She could tilt her head and part her lips, let him stroke his tongue into her mouth. She could brush her own tongue against his, tease them together until he moaned and arched up against her, strong arms tightening as he pulled her even closer to his plush form.

She could slide her hands down his chest to palm the still-small-but-definite rolls spilling over his always-too-tight trousers, and…

And, _Maker take her_ , she was having an obscene fantasy about making out with her virgin husband with the eyes of half of Denerim upon her. Even more, she was starting to get _wet_.

“I said I would, did I not? More than that, I will return with what our country needs,” Anora said with chilly stiffness, immediately shutting down against the unexpected—unprecedented—warmth fluttering through her. She pulled back, leaving Alistair unkissed, and allowed herself to be helped into the waiting carriage.

The crowd gave a loud cheer as the door snapped shut behind her and her Guard began to move. The carriage lurched and King Alistair lifted his hand in a last farewell. Anora fixed her eyes forward as befit a Queen setting out on an important diplomatic mission, hands folded in her lap, expression set. Serene. Stone-faced.

But at the last moment, giving in to overwhelming impulse, she twisted around in her seat to look out the back window. Alistair still stood there, watching the carriage roll farther and farther away. His mobile, expressive mouth was twisted into a sad smile and his shoulders were rounded forward as if, against all odds, he was missing her already. 

However, when their eyes met, his eyebrows jumped in a playful dance and she laughed, feeling an unexpected burst of joy welling up inside her chest.

 _I love you_ , she mouthed at him across the growing distance, feeling it all the way down to her toes.

He startled, straightening up immediately—and the pure _joy_ that split his face in a huge, dazzling grin could have outmatched the sun. _I love you too_ , he mouthed back, laughing…and that was the image she took with her as the carriage made the next turn and stole him from her sight.

King Alistair in his too-tight finery, eyes bright, dimple flashing, perfect happiness on every line of his—yes, truly beloved—face.

It would be months before she would see him again.


	12. Chapter 12

**Excerpts from letters sent between King Alistair and Queen Anora of Ferelden during the months of the royal diplomatic mission:**

i.

_…Rivain is a strange but beautiful place. I cannot help but think you would enjoy it for a day or two, but quickly become baffled and homesick. Their customs, manner of dress, manner of talk, manners in general—they are all so unlike the sturdy, plainspoken people of Ferelden that I am constantly kept on my toes._

_It isn’t as it is in Orlais, where the Game holds sway. People of Rivain say what they mean and mean what they say. It is only that what they mean is so often leagues away from my own understanding of the world that I don’t have a point of commonality to draw upon._

_I find it exhilarating…_

ii.

…come to me for council. I’ve been doing my best to listen and be just, but it’s all so twisty. Why are judgements always so very very twisty? Back when I was with the Chantry, we were told that there was a right and a wrong. Now, I’m starting to suspect it was all a lie.

Just don’t tell any Sisters I said that, would you?

I’m trying to do my best, but it’s difficult with you gone. I wish I could just make a royal decree that all kingly judgements are officially on hold until the queen returns. Don’t they know by now that you’re the brains and I’m merely the pretty face? But, no, I can’t delay my duties—I know that—you can stop scowling at this letter now…

iii.

_…dock in Antiva’s great port city. I expect long, circuitous haggling over the next few weeks as I meet with each of the famed merchant princes in turn. Two we are already familiar with, and I plan to use that to our advantage. They’ll expect me to use our ties, of course, but I have a plan of attack that will cut their protests off at the knees._

_This must be what a general feels on the eve of a great battle. Only when I emerge victorious after months of fighting, there will be no blood shed—only fine red Antivan wine._

_Please don’t think me a monster if I admit that some days, after particularly difficult meetings, I would not mind if there was just a little blood…_

iv.

…be careful in Antiva. I knew an Antivan once; terrible fellow. Loved to talk about leather and knives…

v. 

_…leaving the Free Marches at last and sailing to the final port of call on my diplomatic mission. Orlais was always going to be the most difficult, and potentially most profitable. The history there is, as you know, troubled, and I expect the Game to be in full force. I do not trust any letters I send from the royal court to make it to you unread and unaltered, so for the next span of weeks, do not expect to hear anything from me but banal commentary on the weather._

_I know I will succeed, Alistair. I think of our country—our poor people—and I am filled with a fire that no Game can outmatch. When I return home in just a few more weeks, it will be with the money the royal coffers needs for us to find our feet again._

_Well, that and plenty of fine Orlesian cheese; I hear rumor that the King of Ferelden is a fan…_

vi.

…come home to me. I am counting the days…


	13. Chapter 13

She was finally home on Ferelden soil after _months_ abroad, and she was giddy as a girl.

Anora pressed her hands to her hot cheeks, smiling to herself as her carriage bumped and swayed across Denerim cobblestones. She wasn’t expected back in the capitol for another full week, but she’d urged the captain to greater speeds (and perhaps a bit of recklessness) to see her ashore that much faster. The sun had long since set and there hadn’t been time to waste sending ahead for the royal carriage. Instead, she’d left half her retinue to deal with the cargo and had hired a hackney to take her to the palace at once.

Maker, but she was glad to be back. Tonight she would bathe in her own copper hip-tub, sit before her own hearth, sleep in her own bed.

See her husband after so long away.

Weeks. It had been _weeks_ since they’d been able to exchange the letters that come to mean so much to her, and months since they’d been together. During the first legs of her trip, those letters in Alistair’s charming chickenscratch had been her strongest tethers to home. He spoke of his childhood, his time in the Wardens, his fancies and fears and quirky inner monologue. She felt, oddly, that she knew him better thanks to those letters than she had ever come to know him in two years of marriage.

In return, she had bared her own soul. She told him things she had never dared admit before—ambitions that to some would seem unwomanly. Petty annoyances and triumphs that could seem anything but noble. She had always been so very careful to keep herself just a little removed from the world, heeding her father’s advice to only show a careful façade. She was a clever woman in a man’s world, after all; that mask had been her political armor.

But in these last months, she’d been more honest through her letters than she could ever remember being before, and Alistair hadn’t seemed to draw away. If anything, her confessions urged him on to more confessions of his own, to greater transparency.

Would that intimacy remain, now that she was home? Or would the walls come back up again once they no longer had distance as a buffer?

The carriage clattered up to the door and drew to a stop. She would know soon enough.

Anora drew in an unsteady breath and prepared a gracious smile for the footman as he helped her down. Her traveling robe brushed the stone beneath her as she glided up the steps, its soft _whisk whisk_ underscored by the click of her heels. The door opened before she reached it and a scullery maid bobbed low. Anora passed with a faint nod of acknowledgement.

It was late enough that the castle was quiet, many of the servants turned in early for the evening. Dinner would have already been served—though she had no doubt Cook had roused her maids to get something ready should Anora require a repast after her long journey—and with no formal guests to entertain, Alistair most likely would have retired to his bedchambers.

She hesitated at the foot of the steps and considered going to find the head steward to discuss everything she had missed—to go over plans for the cargo and household income and the newly replenished state of the coffers—but just as she began to turn away from the stairs, she paused. Looked up at the darkened second floor.

Bit the inside of her mouth and took and unsteady step.

Business, she told herself as she climbed the steps, could wait. She had been gone on _business_ for far too long. Her husband was up there, and she wanted… She needed… It had been so long, and she had to…

She had to know. She had to _know_ whether those words he’d mouthed to her across the square had been true. _I love you too_. Did he really?

She couldn’t wait another minute without knowing. She’d already had far, far too long to pick over her own feelings and discover how deeply she’d come to care for the man she’d never expected to marry.

Anora hurried her pace, heart beginning to pound the closer she drew to the royal chambers. Alistair’s personal manservant was slipping out of his room as she came down the hall, shutting the door behind him. That was almost enough to divert Anora from her path, but she stiffened her spine at the last moment, chin lifting. She was Alistair’s _wife_. It wasn’t indecent to seek him out in his bedchamber.

“Is the king awake?” she murmured as she came to a stop in front of his door.

The manservant swallowed. “Ah, yes ma’am. That is, he has just begun to turn in.”

“Thank you.” She reached for the handle, going very still when the man touched her wrist. Anora turned a chilly look on the presumptuous servant, one brow arched. “Yes?”

He quickly snatched his hand away, color flooding his cheeks. “I’m sorry, m’lady. It is only… I thought you should know before you, ah, go in…” The servant trailed off; the pink slowly spread farther under her steady regard, down his neck, across his collar, up to his ears.

Anora waited, curious whether Alistair’s servant would actually dare to _gossip_. It would be one thing if he had politely requested to speak with her alone, where whatever confidence he had to share could be given with the assurance that it would _remain_ a secret. But to grab her, to accost her in the hall, where anyone could overhear?

She had trained the servants to have better sense than that. It was a dangerous thing, letting anyone in a royal household relax their guard. It was clear she had work ahead of her if she wanted to get the staff whipped back into shape before they began receiving foreign dignitaries again.

Thankfully, Alistair’s manservant seemed to realize his blunder before it was too late. He cleared his throat and offered her an elaborate bow before turning and hurrying away. She watched him go, pleased that she wouldn’t have to dismiss him for an unguarded tongue—she truly did hate to do such things—before turning her attention back to her original goal.

Alistair was beyond this door. _Alistair_.

Biting back a ridiculously girlish smile, Anora lightly rasped on the door to announce her presence, then stepped through. She slid the door shut behind her to give them a moment of desperately needed privacy.

“Alistair?”

There was a startled rustle, a shifting and fumbling, and Alistair’s shocked voice: “ _Anora?_ ”

She took a step deeper into his chambers. The room was dim, lit only by a banked fire and a few candles. It was dim enough that it took a moment for her eyes to adjust, even as she moved cautiously across the wide flagons toward the huge wingback chairs. Alistair’s chair was turned away from the door, toward, the fire, but she could just back out a flash of bare forearm and his white-knuckled grip on the armrest, fingers digging tight into the upholstery.

She stopped, suddenly hesitant. This…wasn’t the welcome home she had anticipated.

“Is this…a bad time?” Anora began slowly.

Her husband let out a long, gusting breath. “ _No._ Maker, no. It’s just, ah, I’m not fully dressed.”

Was that all? She’d seen him without a shirt on several occasions. True, those occasions were quite _rare_ , but…she’d thought they were behind this awkward sort of shyness. “I don’t mind,” she said, taking another hesitant step forward. In her mind’s eye, when she’d pictured surprising him, Alistair had been so much happier to see her. There was none of that exuberant charm now, though—only a strange, nearly fearful shyness. 

It hurt, more than she was willing to admit—even to herself. Drawing herself up to her full height, Anora fell back on the cool, untouchable façade she’d learned to wear like armor. “If this isn’t a good time, I will leave you to your rest.”

“ _No!_ ” There was another fumbling rustle, and the _thud_ as his book landed hard on the flagstones. Alistair scrambled up awkwardly—heavily—head popping up over the back of the chair. His eyes were wide, a little wild. His hair was a spiky mess, grown too long and in clear need of a barber. “No, no, ah, no, please, stay. I want you to stay. Please. It’s just. Ahhh…”

He blushed and ducked his head a little, nearly disappearing from sight, only the untamed ruff of his hair visible.

She felt a sharp, incredibly _fond_ spark in her chest at that (because trust Alistair not to take proper care of himself when she was away), but then he was finally shuffling out from behind the huge chair and into full view—and her brain took a sudden, hard turn, like a carriage careening dangerously off its track.

Because Alistair? Had _changed_.

If she hadn’t known for certain it was him, she wouldn’t have recognized him at first glance. Gone was the hard-muscled Warden her servants and female friends had assured her was so gloriously handsome. Gone, too, was the pudgy King with his softening belly and lopsided grin.

The man standing in front of her, wearing loose sleeping pants and a fierce blush, was…

He was _fat_. Her shocked, fumbling mind couldn’t find another word for it. His hips were wide and beautifully curved, flaring from the soft rolls at his waist. His arms were heavy, meaty with muscle and flesh. She could see the freckles that dotted his shoulders and chest, standing in stark relief against the blush that crept further and further down his body the longer she stared. His muscular pecs had gone soft, and when Alistair dipped his head, his second chin deepened, ringing his handsome face in a wide arc.

But far and away the most obvious change was to his stomach. It soared out from his softened chest in a wide arc, jutting out from his body in a proud swell to be broken only by the deep gash of his belly button before tucking back toward his fleshy hips. When Alistair shifted from foot to foot, it swayed— _jiggled_ —big and plush and like _nothing_ she had ever imagined, even in her wickedest fantasies.

“Ahhh,” Alistair said, rubbing at the back of his neck. His entire body rippled with the movement, and, oh Maker, she couldn’t _breathe_. “So, funny thing: I can’t actually tell from your shock-y silence whether this is a, uh, good thing or a bad thing.”

Her mouth was too dry to speak. Anora took a step closer, then another, eyes hungrily scanning his soft, plump frame. His cheeks were adorably rounded now, deep dimple flashing when he made a wry face. His skin looked so pale beneath the map of golden freckles, vulnerable in a way that made her stomach clench in response. When he dropped a shy hand over his belly—as if that could somehow hide its mass from view—and gently rubbed, her own palms itched, and when the flesh there rippled again, she—

Andraste save her; she was getting _wet_.

“You seemed to, ah, like it. Before,” he was saying, stumbling over his words. “At least, you said you did, and I thought I… Well, ah, sooooo. I thought. All right. If she likes big, I can do…big. So I’ve been stuffing myself like a prize hog every day you were gone, figuring by the time you got back, I could be… But if you _don’t_ like it, I could, I, there’s no reason I couldn’t lose it all again. I just thought…”

“Alistair,” Anora interrupted, voice gone low and husky. She cleared her throat, drawing up close. She couldn’t stop herself from reaching out for him, hesitating only a breath before her palms were sliding over the impossibly sweet give of his big belly before sliding back along the rolls of his love handles. They formed an apron of fat, just big enough to fill her palms but not yet so large as to overflow them.

Her husband drew in a sharp breath, then let it out shakily. She couldn’t believe she was touching him like this—so intimately, so… _sexually_ —for the first time in their marriage, but Maker, he felt so _good_ beneath her fingertips. She wanted to push him back into the chair and explore every inch of him. She wanted to run her hands over that gut, to lift it and watch it fall quivering back into place, to pinch his softening chest and kiss the growing swell that ringed his jaw, and—

She swallowed hard, eyes dragging back up to his. Anora dug her fingers into Alistair’s plush sides, loving the give of flesh; her entire body thrummed in response, and she felt her nipples tightening, felt her sex give an unexpected throb, felt all those stupid, ridiculous fireworks she’d thought she’d never get to experience going off inside her body as Alistair moaned and arched into the ungentle touch.

Her husband had seen her interest and understood it even when she couldn’t—even as she still fumbled to comprehend that not only did she like him big and fat, she wanted him bigger. _Fatter_ —and had changed himself for her.

He’d woken something inside of her that made her shiver and quake as she pressed close—pressed into the impossible soft give of his flesh—and wrapped her arms around his neck.

“Thank you,” Anora murmured, meeting Alistair’s eyes. She arched against him, rocking instinctively up against the hot swell of his rounded body. “Maker, you’re beautiful.”

“Ah. So are you. So incredibly beautiful.” He reached up to brush his knuckles across her cheek, a hopeful smile causing those dimples to flash against his chubby cheeks. “You take my breath away. I meant it, you know. I, well. I do love you.”

 _Yes_. She surged up, overwhelmed by a shock of lust and love and gratitude, catching Alistair’s mouth in a desperate kiss. Alistair staggered back a step, nearly knocked off-balance. He grabbed for the back of the chair, and it only took a firm shove to give him the right idea. He sank back without once breaking the kiss, falling back into the chair with a muffled grunt.

Anora followed him down, fire licking through her body. She grabbed at the long ends of her traveling robes and hiked them up as she straddled her husband’s waist. It was so wide—his soft belly falling in the way—that her thighs were forced to stretch until there was a delicious burn. It ached, Maker, so good, and Anora gasped into the kiss, lips parting for the first stroke of his tongue.

She tasted sugar and wine on his lips and impulsively sucked it off his tongue, riding the unsteady jerk of his body. Cailan had taught her to kiss, and she’d learned her lessons well, but never before had she felt so _overwhelmed_ by the act. Her skin felt too tight for her body; the heat coiling low in her stomach seemed to throb in time with her heart, and she canted her hips forward impulsively, seeking relief as the kiss went deep, deeper. The folds of her robe were in the way, but when she pushed her straining thighs forward, she could almost feel the outer swell of Alistair’s rounded gut against her core—and Maker, that just made her ache all the more.

 _Touch me_ , she thought, hands sweeping over him restlessly. She thrust her tongue deeper, in full control of the kiss, and Alistair whined beneath her, straining up. He was clearly unskilled but incredibly eager, panting and shifting to get closer even as he kept his hands politely tearing furrows into the arms of the chair. He squirmed when she slid her hands down the plush rolls at his sides, squeezing and kneading just this side of too rough. A hitch of her hips drove her against the mound of his gut and earned a heartfelt groan from them both; his own hips were twitching up again and again, kiss going desperate.

Too desperate.

It was all…too much.

Anora broke the kiss with a heaving gasp. She stared down at her husband, who stared back in return—flushed rosy red, eyes dilated huge, lips slick and swollen. She wanted to grab him by the too-long hair and drag his head down to her breasts. She wanted to sprawl back on his bed and feel him settle over her—big and soft, belly hanging between them and thick fingers tearing away her smallclothes. She wanted…

 _Him_.

But it was all happening so fast, she also wanted to turn heel and bolt from the room.

“Alistair,” she murmured, breath coming in heaving pants. “I don’t know if…”

He gave a little nod, seeming to understand, and carefully caught her waist. He lifted her, revealing he kept his warrior’s strength despite the changes to his body, and gently set her on her feet. Anora took a stumbling step back, fingertips brushing her lips—watching hungrily as he gripped the arms of the chair and awkwardly hoisted himself up belly-first.

It was incredible, the way the heavy weight of him arced up, then settled with a bounce as he straightened. The way he hadn’t yet adjusted to the change in his center of gravity thanks to the rapid changes in his body over the last half-year. The gravid swell of him settled and he offered her a goofy, boyish grin; she wanted to slide her hands around the curve of his gut and squeeze the soft folds at his sides. Maker, she wanted him so badly.

 _How_ could this be?

“I don’t understand my own reaction,” Anora admitted. Her voice sounded impossibly strained. “Why is the sight of you like… Like _this_ …” She gestured to encompass all of him. “Why does it make me feel like this? I’ve _never_ before wanted…”

She wet her lips.

Alistair cleared his throat and deliberately brought his hands down on his belly, giving it a slap, then rubbing hard. It _rippled_ again, drawing her eye. “It’s like you said,” Alistair murmured as he hefted his weight—played with it in a nakedly deliberate ploy to draw her hungry attention. When he lifted his gut between his hands, Anora noticed for the first time the hard bulge straining against his sleep pants. A small damp patch was visible where the head of his cock pressed; he was just as keyed up as she was, but he was holding himself back. For her. Always for her. “Some people wear different shapes well. And some people are _drawn_ to different shapes. You’re drawn to this.”

At her low noise, he added—carefully, as if testing the waters: “You like to see me absolutely huge, don’t you? Maker, look at me. Look at what I did to myself. I let myself go and swelled up into this big, _fat_ , useless man.” He grabbed his sides at the harsh words, as if bemoaning the gain, and it was like being struck by a lightning bolt. Hearing Alistair talk like that, manhandle himself—it made her suck in a shocked breath and squeeze her slick thighs together.

He gave a crooked smile. “I thought you might like that,” he said. “The abuse-y stuff. Sort of goes with your big grrr arrrrgh front, doesn’t it? Would…would _you_ like to say those kinds of things to me? Would you like to…” He seemed to fumble for words, then brightened as they occurred to him. “Pin me down and stuff me? Fill my gut until I moan for relief, rub the hard swell of it and watch as I grow fatter and _fatter_ for you—too stuffed to escape, under your spell, loving the way you make me, um, swell up until I’m nothing but—”

“Alistair,” she begged, one hand covering her eyes. Her heart was racing so far she thought she might explode. “This is…a _lot_ to take in. For one day.”

“Sorry,” he added meekly.

“No.” She dropped her hand to look at him again, the both of them so turned on it was almost painful—but a smile was tugging at the corners of her mouth, too, answered by the one on his sweet, chubby-cheeked face. “No, don’t be. You’re right. I think I want that. With you. I want _you_. I love you.”

He let out a long, slow breath. “I really like hearing you say that,” her husband admitted.

“Good,” she said, daring to reach out again to brush her fingers along his cheek. It was already getting easier and easier to initiate contact. With each passing moment, it was getting easier and easier to come to grips with what he was awakening inside of her. “Because you’re going to be hearing it all the time now. I promise.”


	14. Chapter 14

The trouble with unlocking this strange new fascination, this lust, was that it wasn’t exactly easy to put away again until she was ready to act on it. Anora found herself thinking about it (obsessing over it) at the most inopportune times.

Like: Sitting at a banquet she and the king were hosting, chatting with dignitaries from Nevarra and Orlais…then losing track of what she was saying when she glanced over and noticed the way Alistair’s fine red coat was gaping dangerously around its buttons.

Or: Dancing with her husband after another large banquet, each step making him redder and redder as he fought to keep up with the tempo, her body brushing the hard, round, _stuffed_ jut of his belly as they glided and swirled.

Or: Sitting in a chair and fighting not to squirm as he was measured yet again for clothing, the seamstress wrapping a measuring tape around his ever-growing middle, then cursing quietly as she kept dropping the ends, unable to reach around his girth.

Or: Walking out to greet their people on the eve of a great holiday and realizing—as she watched him out of the corner of her eyes the way she always did now—that Alistair had begun to subtly waddle just after a big meal.

Or: Gasping and squeezing her thighs tight together when, wearing his newest clothing only a few weeks old, he bowed to great a visiting ambassador and froze in horror at the steady _riiiiiip_ of his trousers bursting open around his ever-growing backside.

Or perhaps worst of all: Startling as he caught her hand just as they were supposed to rise and call an end to an evening’s festivities. “I can’t,” he murmured, staring up at her with huge eyes and a crooked, disbelieving smile. “I’m…I bloody well think I’m stuck.”

She flushed, entire body going meltingly hot in an instant as she settled back into her seat, looking him over. He’d been eating steadily the entire feast, the way he always seemed to be doing now, and…yes, it appeared to be true. He’d stuffed himself so full, he was wedged dangerously tight into his throne. That soft belly was a mountain now, arching out from the pillowy mounds of his tits. It looked like a boulder perched in his lap, so full it was forcing his fat thighs to part. 

The rolls of fat—so much bigger now that when she’d first returned home from her long voyage—swelled over the sides of the wooden armrests and Anora could only imagine how snugly his huge arse was wedged into the seat. Each breath seemed to be a challenge, his stomach so packed with food he barely had the energy to lift his head.

“Can you squirm free?” Anora murmured, trying to hide the flustered heat in her cheeks. She shifted, ignoring the steady throb between her thighs by will alone. Maker, but there was something incredibly wrong about how much this was turning her on.

Alistair huffed a breath and tried to shift in place, only to moan and press a palm across the rounded curve of his gut. “I…ah, no. Not so much.”

“Maker.” She wet her lips and glanced around, then subtly reached out to press a hand to him. He was rock-hard and tight as a drum; if he were standing, there would be no gentle give to his body. Instead, it would soar out from him as if he were a woman more than ready to give birth. He would certainly waddle now, round curve of that gut forcing his thighs apart, center of gravity off. She wanted—

She wanted to see that happen.

She wanted to see him pop out of the straining coat, exploding buttons every which way. She wanted to know her husband had gotten so incredibly, unbelievably _fat_ that he had outgrown everything he owned, from his clothes to his thrown to his bed.

Anora bit her lower lip and rubbed her fingers against the soft velvet covering Alistair’s belly, dilated eyes meeting dilated eyes. Oh. Oh, Maker, he was just as aroused by the idea as she was. She made a rash decision. “Keep eating,” she whispered, leaning closer.

The flush painting his cheeks deepened. “Ah. What?”

“I want you to keep eating.” Most of their guests were too drunk to pay attention, and the thought of ordering him to keep going was making her wetter by the moment. “I want you to…” She fought for the wicked words that had been circling about her head ever since that night she returned home. “I want you to let everyone see what an absolute pig you are. I want you to stuff yourself with sweets until that disgustingly fat gut of yours pops free of the last shreds of your clothing.”

He gaped at her, and she almost apologized—but no, that was a flare of interest in his eyes. He _wanted_ this.

“You think I’m disgusting?” Alistair murmured, voice husky. He pressed both palms over the dome of his gut and stroked them down, highlighting the heavily pregnant swell of him. “Maker, maybe I am. The only reason I stopped shoveling food into this thing is because it got so big I couldn’t reach the platter for more. See?” Alistair leaned forward, hard edge of his stomach butting up against the table. It wasn’t quite true that he couldn’t reach the trenchers of food, but it wasn’t far off. It’d at least be a strain. “See how _fat_ I am? Too fat to feed myself anymore.”

Anora swallowed, forcing herself to sound cool and collected. “I see. Well, if you’ve become such a pathetic _pig_ that you can’t even shovel slop into that monstrosity…” She looked up and beckoned. Immediately, one of the footmen stepped forward. “The king requires more,” she said.

The footman hesitated. “More…what, ma’am?”

She cast the man her best cool, detached glance. “Take a look at him,” she said. “Obviously more _everything_.”

He stared for a moment, then dipped his head and moved to bring Alistair _more_.

“Andraste’s tits, Anora,” Alistair hissed, eyes wide.

“Hush,” she snapped, and heat bloomed through her core at the way he immediately quieted. “If you’re going to be a little piggy, then you’re going to pay the consequences. You are not leaving that chair unless someone takes pity and pries you free in front of all of our guests, or it breaks under your shameful weight.”

He moaned, very quietly—but swallowed it back as the platters were set in front of him. And then, casting her quick looks, Alistair continued to eat.

The next hour passed in what felt like a daze; it was almost as if she had been drugged. Every time she shifted, she felt a flush of heat spreading through her body. Every time Alistair made a low, gasping noise and tried to adjust the huge rock of his belly, she felt a secret throb between her thighs. She leaned in now and again as he shoveled sweets into his mouth, purring about how much of a glutton he had become, how he was surely too fat to waddle his way up the stairs, how if he tried to climb into the royal bed tonight, it would break beneath his weight. She reached out when she dared to rub a hand over his straining flesh or pinch at the folds at his sides.

Knowing how much he had already put away, watching as he forced himself to consume whole rich desserts bite after bite after bite, as if testing the mettle of his famous Warden appetite, she couldn’t help but think just how much _fatter_ he’d be by the time tonight was through.

Maker, the thought of that was almost enough to make her drag him up to their room and…and _have_ him. She felt powerful and electrified and so turned on she couldn’t stand it.

And then, just as she thought she might go mad from wanting him, Alistair took the last bite of a rich dark chocolate torte…and one of the buttons straining to hold in his massive girth snapped off with an audible _pop_!

Alistair froze, eyes wide. There was a flash of white in the gaping hole created by the missing button, impossible to miss. Anora glanced up through her lashes as she pretended to take a sip of her wine and studied their guests. The entire court was pretending not to notice, but oh Maker, they had.

There was a weighted silence before conversation began again. But Alistair shifted, taking a hitching breath—and three more buttons went exploding from his coat, straining ends falling open and gut rolling forward.

Someone gasped and someone else tittered. Alistair just stared down at himself, expression stunned. If he had looked ridiculous earlier, now he looked like a farce of a man—leaning back, pinned beneath the huge dome of his belly, surely all anyone could see of him was that wide gut (now visibly straining against his shirt’s buttons too, and oh Maker, would he lose those as well?) and fat-cheeked face with its heavy second chin, big arms useless at his sides. He looked as if he could be rolled across the marble floor, hugely round, and that image was so overwhelming that Anora stood immediately, aware of eyes dragging from Alistair to herself.

“I thank you for coming,” she said in her most regal, iciest manner. “But I believe it is time to retire.”

That was Alistair’s cue to rise as well. He huffed a breath, struggling to grip the arms of his chair. He couldn’t seem to get leverage, arms flailing, buttons straining. He was cherry red, feet skidding against the ground as he tried—and failed—to lever himself out of the chair. If he had wedged himself in before, now he was well and truly _stuck_ , and the sight of him futilely trying to pry his jiggling body free sent wave after wave of heat through her.

Anora snapped her fingers and footmen quickly appeared. “Help your King,” she ordered. They moved at once to obey, one grabbing one of Alistair’s flailing hands, the other snagging a second. The third leaned behind the throne and grabbed for his pits, trying to pull him up and out.

It was ridiculous, and more than one person was stifling a laugh. The mortification had Alistair flushed an alarming shade of red as he twisted and squirmed and swallowed curses, but when he met Anora’s eyes, they were _gleaming_.

 _You love this too,_ she thought, biting back a fierce smile. _You love that the entire court is here to see you so fat you can’t even stand under your own steam. Something is very wrong with the both of us._

Finally, with a great heave, the three men managed to yank her husband free—but not before another two buttons popped free, this time from his white shirt. A flash of thick freckled flesh was visible in the gap, and the hem had long since risen up from his breeches to reveal a half-moon of fat. His belly settled low over his privates as he tried to straighten, heaving great breaths.

Then, one hand holding the bottom swell of his gut as if to help with its great weight, Alistair offered her a hand. “My Queen,” he said. And _winked._

She bit the inside of her mouth. “My King,” she said, taking his hand, loving how small and delicate her fingers appeared in that great big maw. They moved away from the table slowly, Alistair rocking back and forth with each step, belly a divining rod in front of him. In the end, they had to call two of the footmen to come help him up the stairs a step at a time, each taking the weight of his lean in turn as he carefully lifted his paunch and a thick thigh. Anora stayed by his side the entire time, following his heaving form back into his quarters.

Alistair’s royal manservant sprang forward once they entered, but she waved him and the footmen away. “I will tend to the king tonight,” she said. She could sense them hesitating—surely uncertain how she could possibly manage on her own—but they listened to her order without even looking again at their king. One by one, they trailed out. The door closed behind them.

Anora let out a heavy breath. “Maker,” she said, turning to Alistair. “I can’t believe what happened tonight.”

“Trust me, love,” he groaned, pulling fitfully at the last buttons holding his shirt together. “I can feel how much it happened. Maker, I have never eaten so much; I feel so…” He trailed off.

Anora moved to help him pull off his coat, then shirt. Revealing all that gorgeous pale skin with its freckles and deep, pink stretch marks made her heart give a lurch. “You feel so?” she prompted.

He just barked a laugh. “ _Huge_. Maker, look how big I swelled up. So…” he cast her a sly look, “… _fat_ and useless; too big for my clothes. The way they had to pry me free, all because I’d eaten myself clean out of my chair…”

She swatted at him, crouching to try to unfasten his breeches. “You don’t have to tease me,” she said, waiting patiently for Alistair to lift the heavy hang of his gut before she unbuttoned him. He sighed in relief as she began to peel his breeches and smalls off. “I promise you, I am already very, ah…intrigued.”

“Ooooooh?” He waggled his brows.

Anora just flushed and gently herded him back toward the bed. “ _Yes_ ,” she said, tenderly helping Alistair as he climbed oh-so carefully onto his bed. It creaked and groaned beneath his weight, and he huffed in a pained breath when he had to swing himself around, but that awful sound translated into a blissful sigh when he was finally laying supine, head pillowed, hands rubbing over his big gut, thick thighs spread invitingly by its weight.

He was just so beautiful that she couldn’t help but steal a kiss as she leaned over to adjust his pillow…and that kiss lingered, growing longer and hotter as the seconds ticked past. His tongue in her mouth, the taste of chocolate filling her senses…the warmth of his bare skin beneath her hand when she dropped a palm to rub over his belly…the noises he made as she sucked his tongue into her mouth, needing to taste him, needing…

Anora pulled back, flushed and panting, staring down at her husband. He was so different from the young, hard-muscled warrior she had married. He had changed for her. He had woken a hunger inside of _her_ , one that felt keyed up and restless and more starved than ever tonight.

She wanted him. She loved him.

It was time.

“Do you think you could handle one last dessert?” Anora murmured, loving the way his eyes widened in dismay.

But Alistair nodded, slapping a hand gently against his belly. “Good thing for this Warden appetite, then,” he said. “If you want to stuff another few bites inside me, I suppose I can find room. But don’t be surprised if I really do break the bed soon. What will it be?” he added, watching her with trusting, loving eyes. “More chocolate? A tart? Ooh, some nice cheese?”

She laughed and reached up to unfasten her golden hair. It fell from its intricate coils, spilling down her back as she shook it free. Alistair’s brows arched, and they only grey higher, his eyes going wider, as she reached up and began unfastening her dress.

“Ah,” he began, blinking rapidly. “Anora…”

“Hush,” she said. She wriggled free of her gown, letting it pool around her feet. He was breathing hard, she saw, huge mound of his belly rising and falling rapidly. She was breathing hard too, nerves and excitement twining in her stomach as she tugged up and off her chemise, then slipped out of her smallclothes and breastband.

She was as lovely naked as she was clothed—it wasn’t vanity to recognize that. Anora stepped forward, skin alight everywhere Alistair’s gaze touched, and she shivered hard when the bed groaned in protest as she slung a thigh onto the mattress and climbed in with her husband for the very first time.

“Anora,” he groaned, trying to shift toward her, only to be kept pinned in place by his own weight.

Maker, she was dripping wet, aching for him. All her life she’d thought she was broken, that she couldn’t feel desire, and yet here she was, rising to her knees before the sheer mountainous bulk of her husband, so aroused she could barely stand it. “I want you, Alistair,” Anora said, eyes locked with his.

He whined deep in his throat. “I want you too,” he said. “But…Maker, I don’t know if I can. I’m too…I can barely move.”

She bit her bottom lip, studying him. From this angle, she couldn’t see his feet. She couldn’t see _anything_. He was so stuffed it almost seemed as if all he was was face and arms and belly. But, if her handmaiden’s whispers were to be believed…maybe that was all they needed.

“Tell me if I hurt you,” she warned, leaning down to kiss him once hard. Anora slid a hand down to cup one of his breasts, deliberately testing its heft before straightening again. She licked her lips, staring him down. “Look at you,” she said, making her voice go cold again. “Look how useless you are. You’re so fat you can’t even stand on your own, can you?”

He groaned and briefly closed his eyes, flushed. But he was opening them again a second later, watching her with eager fixation. “I can’t,” he said, rocking back and forth, letting his huge belly sway. “I’m trying so hard, but I can’t even sit up. I’m pinned down, so heavy, so big…”

“Then I’ll have to take my pleasure from you, useless as you are,” she said. Holding her breath, Anora rose up onto one knee, balancing gracefully—shivering at the way his eyes hungrily followed the bob of her breasts—before swinging her other thigh over his shoulders. She shifted, knees bracketing his face, risen up over him.

She actually saw the moment Alistair understood. His eyes went huge, mouth falling open, but before she could second-guess herself, he was reaching up to cup her firm ass, nodding subtly. Oh, how he wanted it. How he wanted _her_. She could read it in his eyes.

Licking his lips, she gave a subtle nod back. “Perhaps I should put that hungry mouth to use,” she said, the words coming naturally to her.

Alistair didn’t answer—he just moaned, urging her closer, tongue brushing along her folds as she settled close.

Anora almost lifted away in shock at the first wet touch of his tongue, but when he slid the flat along her clit, she jerked and _moaned_ , shuddering hard in response. He hummed in response, eagerly devouring her, moving his face with the untrained shifts of her thighs. It was the most incredible sensation she had ever felt, a thousand times better than all the times her previous husband had tried to awaken her this way—because of him. Because of Alistair. Because of the shocking changes he’d made to his body, and the way he awoke that need in her using the one key she would never have thought to use.

Writhing over him, flushed and panting, she could just reach back and feel the huge breadth of him—could imagine his gut straining and bouncing with their rhythm—and the lash of his tongue mixed with the thought of how _wonderful_ it was going to be from now on as they explored his growing body together was enough to send her toppling over into orgasm for the first time in her life.

After, panting and curled against his bulk, Anora pressed her face against Alistair’s shoulder. He had one arm wrapped around her and was brushing back long strands of golden hair. His face reflected so much love her heart actually hurt with it.

“Oh,” she breathed, looking up at him. She felt incandescent. “So…that’s what all the fuss is about.”

He gave a barking laugh. “More or less,” he said. Then he waggled his brows. “Though with us, looks like it’s going to veer toward more.”

“Do you need,” she began, glancing down his body.

Alistair just shook his head. “Next time,” he said. “When I’m a little less round a little more malleable. You can, uh, push up my belly and climb on top and, uh, ride me as… Oh, you do like all that, don’t you?”

Anora swatted at his shoulder, cherry red and squirming. “It looks like I do,” she said. Almost shyly, she reached out to rub her palm against his hard gut as if she could urge him softer again by sweetness alone. “Hurry up and digest that feast, get a little fatter, and I’ll show you.”

“A _little_ fatter?” Alistair scoffed. “Did you see what you made me eat, you horrible woman? Why, I’d be shocked if I ever—”

But she didn’t let him finish that thought, stealing the words in a deep, claiming kiss—body blissed out and throwing off sparks and, all around, happier than she’d ever thought possible.


End file.
